


You On My Mind

by deathishauntedbyhumans



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Canon Compliant, During Canon, Emotional Hurt, Episode: s03e06, F/F, Gen, Internal Monologue, Missing Scene, Past Relationship(s), Pining, Wordcount: 100-1.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-06
Updated: 2020-06-06
Packaged: 2021-03-04 03:40:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 790
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24576940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deathishauntedbyhumans/pseuds/deathishauntedbyhumans
Summary: After Jack decides to single-handedly go to war with England (and Spain), and Max and Rogers and Eleanor have all talked, they have a little downtime where another important conversation is had.
Relationships: Eleanor Guthrie/Max
Kudos: 10





	You On My Mind

**Author's Note:**

> This appeared in my mind and wouldn’t leave me be so here we are fam

Eleanor walks Max out when Woodes is finished with them both, because he gives her a look that, already, she can well-interpret. He obviously needs a break.

She can do that for him. Whether or not she wants to admit it, he has already done so much for her that she will never be able to make up to him. At the very least, she can allow him a few minutes to collect his thoughts alone.

“You have something else on your mind,” Max says at the door. There is no one else around, no guards, no nosy Spanish spies, no pirates. It’s just the two of them, alone, for the second time in just as many weeks. Max looks at her from beneath her lashes, and then tilts her chin up in a subtle, bold bid to force an answer out of her. “Say your piece, Eleanor.“ And _oh_ , the way her name falls from Max’s lips shouldn’t stir the long-forgotten fire inside her stomach, her chest, her loins the way it does. “There is nobody around to hear.”

Max has always been good at reading her, at reading _people._ It isn’t fair that she has retained the skill while Eleanor has been thrust so unceremoniously back into the web of lies and half-truths and fear that her father had kept her in for most of her childhood. 

It is late, and she is exhausted, and scared, and _raw._ Eleanor can blame her impulsivity —a trait that she has insofar been able to temper in front of pleasant company, Woodes notwithstanding— on that, and not on the fact that Max still, after all this time, holds her in right the palm of her hand and wrapped around her finger. 

“Did you fuck them both?” Eleanor asks bluntly. It sounds… much more desperate than she wants it to, once it’s out in the open between them, and not nearly as biting as it could. 

Max doesn’t look surprised at the question. If anything, a flutter of resignation hurries over her features so quickly that Eleanor almost believes she might have imagined it. “I do not believe that that is truly any of your business,” she replies, though not unkindly. She sounds as though she is speaking to a child, and perhaps, in a way, she is. She appeals to the scared little girl in Eleanor, she always has. It does not matter if she is seducing her or doing the opposite: something about Max has always been able to venture right to the very core of her. 

“Max—“

“It is not,” Max interrupts gently. “However, I will tell you this: What Anne Bonny and I had was not dissimilar to the relationship I once held with you. Jack… was a different story.” The ever-present lilt of her voice is as soothing as it ever is, even when the words Max says put Eleanor on edge. “Neither will keep me from the life I have made for myself here. You do not have anything to worry about.”

The reassurance speaks to a private place within her, and Eleanor knows Max well enough to understand that it is intentional. Max is not merely talking about keeping the street sated and in Woodes’ favour, and they both know it.

Something else about that statement, though, strikes a chord within her. “You finally understand,” Eleanor says, with a wry, sad half-smile. 

Max’s brow furrows slightly. “What do I understand?”

“How important this place is,” Eleanor replies softly. “How much this place means when you hold so much stake in it. The _life_ that Nassau offers. That’s why I—“

“That is why you could not leave,” Max finishes for her, with her own voice fallen just as soft. “I do understand, now.” She pauses, thinking, and then adds, “It does not change the past, or what happened between us.”

Her own smile is gone, now. Eleanor cannot hold onto it any longer. “No,” she agrees. She and Max stare at each other, watch each other, take each other in in the dim light surrounding them. And then Max turns away from her, taking her gaze away in one easy, fluid whirl that makes Eleanor ache with half-slumbering desire.

“Goodnight, Eleanor. Try to get some sleep. I sense that you will need all of your strength to deal with the trial of the coming days.”

Eleanor says nothing in response, and Max walks away from her without looking back, even though Eleanor feels her heart clench painfully with every step further that she takes. She stands in the doorway for a long while, until Woodes’ footsteps on the stairs jar her from her thoughts and she turns to greet him, forcing her features impassive once more. 

**Author's Note:**

> Anyways I haven’t finished the show yet so rip me if anything in canon after this ep negates what I’ve written lmao
> 
> Kudos/comments are love! Come scream at me on tumblr @deathishauntedbyhumans


End file.
